This morning, when I thought sure I saw
some flames in the trees outside our house, I thought of how often I’m sure I
see precisely what’s happening with my students. As it turned out, the flames were just the
lights of several streetlamps shining and shifting in a breeze through the
leaves, and more than occasionally my appraisal of my students is just as
mistaken. If I assume that a student does not understand a sentence in story, I
might be missing the wisdom that is showing him an understanding I had never
considered. If the kids come through the door with an uninterested expression
and I surmise that they won’t be motivated, I may have misjudged, and be met,
when class starts, by focused faces and minds. My life, I’m afraid, is filled
with mirages and misunderstandings, like the fires I thought I saw this
morning, and the unawareness I sometimes think I see in my secretly astute
young scholars.
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